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Mozilla throws $385k at open source projects including Tor and NVDA

MOSS Mission Partners programme is go

SOFTWARE COMPANY Mozilla has splashed a bit of cash to fluff up the sort of projects that it finds acceptable, for example Tor and Non-Visual Desktop Access (NVDA), which looks to improve the technology experience for the visually impaired.

The money has come from the Mozilla Open Source Support (MOSS) Mission Partners awards. Eight projects will get a slice of $385,000, and Mozilla expects that the money will help move things forward and keep the internet as open and as accessible as possible.

"Aside from accessibility, security and privacy are common themes in this set of awards. We are supporting several secure communications tools, a web server which only works in secure mode, and a distributed, client-side, privacy-respecting search engine," said Mozilla.

"NVDA is just one of eight grantees in a wide range of key disciplines and technology areas that we have chosen to support as part of the MOSS Mission Partners track. This track financially supports open source software projects doing work that meaningfully advances Mozilla's mission and priorities."

MOSS has a budget for this year of $1.25m. NVDA gets $15,000 to help with its screen reader work, Tor is getting $152,500 to keep doing what it does, and Tails, a secure-by-default live operating system, picks up $77,000. Caddy, an HTTP/2 web server with encryption at its front, has been awarded $50,000.

"Tor is a system for using a distributed network to communicate anonymously and without being tracked. This award will be used to significantly enhance the Tor network's metrics infrastructure so that the performance and stability of the network can be monitored and improvements made as appropriate," said Mozilla.

The remaining $90,000 is going to Mio, an asynchronous I/O library written in Rust, where it will be used to work on a TLS extension standard in the Internet Engineering Task Force and build client-side and a server-side implementations.

A search engine called PeARS, described as a lightweight and privacy-aware option, will be funded towards a beta, while the Godot game engine also gets a cash injection.

"This is only the beginning. Stay tuned for more award announcements as we allocate funds. Open source is a movement that is only growing in numbers and in importance. Operating in the open makes for better security, better accessibility, better policy, better code and, ultimately, a better world," added Mozilla.

"So if you know any projects whose work furthers the Mozilla Mission, send them our way and encourage them to apply." µ